- A Note From The Publisher
Hey, everyone …
It’s a web-only “FIREHOSE FRIDAY” at the freedom movement’s daily newspaper. I’m drafting this message at about 6pm Eastern on Thursday and may or may not update it before it posts; as of right now, we’ve got 94 news stories, opinion pieces, and audio/video links lined up for you here at our web edition and I’m reasonably confident that number will move past 100 before “press time” early Friday morning.
We’ve been moving away from “web-only” editions the last few months, instead publishing a regular 60-item email/social media edition and posting EXTRA material to the web edition. We’ve usually got at least another 20 or so posts for you on the web.
What’s different this week (and probably next week)? Steve Trinward is traveling, and I’m covering for him, so I’ve got more work to do than usual. Don’t break out the world’s smallest violin or anything. I’m not complaining (Steve covers for me when I’m traveling, too). Going “web-only” takes just a little bit of the extra work off my plate and lets me focus on the content instead of the formatting and such.
We’re a reader-supported publication. You’re a reader. I’d like nothing better than for Steve to return from his travels (he just had a birthday, too!) with a little more money waiting for him than usual (I won’t turn down my share, either). If you find our work valuable, you can show your love for us at:
https://news.rationalreview.com/support-rrnd
Have a great weekend, and we … er, I … will be back with the regular edition on Monday!
Yours in liberty,
Tom Knapp
Publisher
Rational Review News Digest / Freedom News Daily - EU court upholds Spanish amnesty law as compatible with EU law
Source: Al Jazeera [Qatari state media]
“A Spanish law granting amnesty to those involved in Catalonia’s separatist drive does not violate European Union law, the EU’s top court says, in a boost to the Spanish government and its Catalan allies. The Court of Justice ruled on Thursday that EU law does not preclude the Spanish amnesty law because its adoption and application fall within the competence of member states. … In 2024, the Spanish lower house approved a law to annul the criminal records of hundreds of officials and activists involved in crimes related to the Catalonian secessionist push from 2011.” (07/16/26)
- UK: Court jails young hackers for massive London transport cyberattack
Source: South China Morning Post [Hong Kong]
“A UK court on Thursday jailed two young men for a 2024 cyberattack on London’s public transport operator that exposed the details of millions of customers, in one of Britain’s biggest data breaches. Thalha Jubair, 20, from East London, and 18-year-old Owen Flowers from England’s West Midlands were each handed five-and-a-half-year sentences at London’s Woolwich Crown Court. The pair pleaded guilty last month to hacking Transport for London’s (TfL) network between August 31 and September 3, 2024, gaining access to around 7 million customers’ names and contacts.” (07/16/26)
- US DOJ: Cities that block ICE gang activity could lose police, rape kit funding
Source: USA Today
“Fresno City Attorney Andrew Janz was furious to learn that the Trump administration is threatening to withhold grant money the city uses to help prosecute rapists — all because the California city was deemed a refuge for immigrants. ‘Justice for victims shouldn’t be politicized. It has nothing to do with immigration enforcement,’ Janz told USA TODAY. It’s the latest example of the Trump administration’s promise to withhold funding from cities it calls ‘sanctuary jurisdictions.’ It pressures cities to sign cooperation agreements with Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials with the strongest tool at its disposal: money.” (07/16/26)
- Highway Executive Given 12-Year Sentence Over Deadly Bridge Collapse in Italy
Source: New York Times
“The former chief executive of an Italian highway operator was handed a 12-year prison sentence by an Italian court on Thursday for lapses that contributed to the collapse of a major bridge in Genoa in 2018 that killed 43 people. The former executive, Giovanni Castellucci, oversaw the highway operator, Autostrade per l’Italia, that ran the bridge — named for its designer, Riccardo Morandi — when the structure failed on Aug. 14, 2018. … Since July 2022, Mr. Castellucci had stood trial with 56 other defendants, including others from the company and civil servants from the Transport Ministry. Mr. Castellucci was convicted of negligence and manslaughter, and prosecutors had asked for a sentence of about 18 years.” (07/16/26)
- US weekly unemployment claims fall to 208,000, fewest in 10 weeks
Source: Newsday
“Filings for unemployment benefits fell last week to the lowest level in 10 weeks as U.S. layoffs remain historically low. The number of Americans applying for jobless aid in the week ending July 11 dropped by 8,000 to 208,000, the Labor Department reported Thursday. That’s well below the 219,000 new applications forecast by analysts surveyed by the data firm FactSet. Weekly filings for unemployment benefits are considered a proxy for layoffs and are close to a real-time indicator of the health of the U.S. job market.” (07/16/26)
https://www.newsday.com/business/unemployment-benefits-jobless-claims-layoffs-labor-k38451
- Palestine: Israeli strikes kill five in Gaza
Source: CBC News [Canadian state media]
“Israeli strikes killed at least five Palestinians in the Gaza Strip on Thursday, Palestinian health officials said …. Medics said an Israeli airstrike killed two people near the Tuffah neighbourhood in the north of the enclave, while a third person was killed in Israeli tank shelling in the Zeitoun suburb in eastern Gaza City. Another airstrike at a tent encampment for displaced people in western Gaza City killed one person and wounded several, while an attack on a vehicle in Khan Younis, in the south, killed another, medics said.” (07/16/26)
https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/israeli-strikes-gaza-deaths-9.7272255
- Eli Lilly to buy psychedelics maker AtaiBeckley for $2.8 billion as experimental treatments gain traction
Source: CNBC
“Eli Lilly will acquire psychedelic drugmaker AtaiBeckley for $2.8 billion up front, the company said Thursday, as momentum grows for using versions of the drugs as mental health treatments. The transaction gives Lilly access to AtaiBeckley’s experimental DMT-based drug that’s being studied in Phase 3 clinical trials for treatment-resistant depression. AtaiBeckley is developing several other psychedelics for mental health conditions, including one related to MDMA, also known as ecstasy.” (07/16/26)
https://www.cnbc.com/2026/07/16/eli-lilly-to-buy-psychedelics-maker-ataibeckley-2point8-billion.html
- Spain: PM’s Wife Will Face Jury Trial Over Embezzlement Charges, Court Rules
Source: US News & World Report
“The wife of Spain’s prime minister will stand trial before a jury on charges of influence peddling and embezzlement, a court ruled on Thursday, in a further setback for the government embroiled in months of graft investigations and scandals. Begoña Gomez’s defence team had launched an appeal, asking Madrid’s high court to drop the charges made against her that she denies, and lift other orders imposed on her by a lower court last month. The Madrid court dropped a third charge of corruption in business against Gomez, and lifted the lower court’s order barring her from leaving the country, making her regularly report to court and requiring her to surrender her passport.” (07/16/26)
- US FDA approves new pill to slash cholesterol levels
Source: Seattle Times
“The Food and Drug Administration approved a daily pill on Thursday that can lower cholesterol levels far below what can be achieved with statins, the cheap cholesterol-reducing pills. The drug, enlicitide, whose brand name is Lipfendra, is made by the pharmaceutical company Merck. Clinical trials have shown that it can bring levels of LDL — the dangerous type of cholesterol — down to 50 or 60 or even lower. Adults not taking cholesterol-lowering drugs usually have levels above 100. It works by inhibiting a protein known as PCSK9.” (07/16/26)
- Stop the Presses! Congress Denies Netanyahu Something He Asked For!
Source: Garrison Center
by Thomas L Knapp“‘I want to stop American aid,’ Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on June 30. ‘It’s like welfare; I don’t want it.’ Usually, Netanyahu gets anything he demands from Uncle Sugar. But on July 15, the US House of Representatives voted, 314-104 against even partially granting his wish. Every Republican except Thomas Massie of Kentucky, and more than half of Democrats, voted down an amendment that would have removed $3.3 billion in ‘Foreign Military Financing’ aid from the National Security, Department of State, and Related Programs Appropriations Act. What’s up with that? … This may be the first time I’ve ever found myself in agreement with Benjamin Netanyahu on anything. Well, partial agreement, anyway. US aid to Israel isn’t ‘like welfare.’ It IS welfare.” (07/16/26)
- Ignorance Is Not Bliss: The Dumbing Down of America
Source: Independent Institute
by Richard K Vedder“The news is awash with reports that younger Americans are learning less than their parents did a generation ago. One in eight freshmen at the highly selective University of California, San Diego campus place below high school levels in math, leading professors to complain that declining student proficiency is imperiling their ability to provide at least a modicum of math competency. Grade inflation is also leading university students to study far less than their parents or grandparents did in college—for much higher grades. Are we becoming a nation of lazy dumbbells?” (07/16/26)
https://www.independent.org/article/2026/07/16/ignorance-is-not-bliss-the-dumbing-down-of-america/
- Washington’s Two Rogue Allies in the Middle East Face Off
Source: Libertarian Institute
by Ted Galen Carpenter“Allies and clients have frequently entangled their great power patrons in needless geopolitical crises and sometimes even bloody wars. The tragic events leading to World War I in 1914 are a classic example. Serbia helped drag Czarist Russia into that bloody maelstrom and Austria-Hungary did the same to Wilhelmine Germany. Similar dangers exist today in the international system. Two of Washington’s current most odious and dangerous ‘loose cannon’ allies are Israel and Turkey. U.S. administrations have funded and armed both countries for decades and routinely excused outrageous acts that their clients have committed. Even worse from the standpoint of America’s best interests and purported values, the respective governments have increasingly competitive political and strategic objectives.” (07/16/26)
https://libertarianinstitute.org/articles/washingtons-two-rogue-allies-in-the-middle-east-face-off
- ICE Is Trump’s Standing Army Now
Source: Persuasion
by Luke Hallam“One of the greatest worries for the Founding Fathers was the specter of ‘standing armies’—a permanent, professional military under the direct control of the president. … Two and a half centuries later, with permanent armies and police forces very much the norm, we view such statements as a relic of the 18th century no longer applicable to the modern world. Yet the Founding Fathers were right to draw a connection between standing armies and liberty—and in this case, Madison’s comment about an ‘overgrown Executive’ is prophetic.” (07/16/26)
https://www.persuasion.community/p/ice-is-trumps-standing-army-now
- Trump’s “All Stick, No Carrot” Iran Policy Has No Exit
Source: Antiwar.com
by Greg Pence“The ceasefire was supposed to mark the beginning of the end of a crisis. Instead, it quickly became a symbol of strategic failure. With renewed clashes in the Strait of Hormuz, fresh U.S. strikes on Iranian military targets, and Tehran’s retaliation, the last hopes that the Donald Trump administration could manage the Iran crisis through negotiations have collapsed. What remains today is not a clear path toward an agreement, but a return to the familiar instruments that have defined U.S. policy for years: economic pressure, military threats, and the use of hard power.” (07/16/26)
- Credibility crisis: Graham Platner received glowing media coverage before dramatic exit from Senate race
Source: Fox News
by Joseph A Wulfsohn“Before Graham Platner’s dramatic exit from the Maine Senate race last week, the Democratic hopeful received glowing coverage from the legacy media that pushed the narrative that he was a salt-of-the-earth oyster farmer who could win back male voters and unseat longtime Republican incumbent Susan Collins. Now out of the race after multiple scandals, including a rape allegation from a former girlfriend that he’s denied, the friendly coverage he received is getting a second look.” (07/16/26)
- “Speed to Power” doesn’t require a utility monopoly
Source: Niskanen Center
by Rachel Levine & Zachary Norris“If policymakers are serious about ‘Speed to Power,’ they should focus on permitting reform. Yet a coalition of utilities has repackaged a longstanding argument that the best way to speed up transmission development is to curtail competitive bidding for transmission projects in the Midwest and Plains. Their proposal overlooks both the driving causes of project slowdowns and the many benefits of competition.” (07/16/26)
https://www.niskanencenter.org/speed-to-power-doesnt-require-a-utility-monopoly
- Drugs Keep Winning in the Global War on Drugs
Source: Reason
by Niko Vorobyov“Late last month, the United Nations published its annual World Drug Report, chronicling the latest developments in the global war on drugs. Not only are the drugs winning that war, but there are greater quantities and more varieties of recreational chemicals available than ever before.” (07/16/26)
https://reason.com/2026/07/16/drugs-keep-winning-in-the-global-war-on-drugs/
- Shareholders and Stakeholders in Corporate Law
Source: American Institute for Economic Research
by Robert T Miller“There are two main theories of corporate governance: the shareholder theory and the stakeholder theory. The former, which originated in the earliest corporate law decisions of courts of equity in the nineteenth century, requires directors to manage the corporation for the long-term benefit of its shareholders. The latter, which is largely the creation of academics, holds that directors should balance the interests of all corporate stakeholders, including employees, customers, suppliers, creditors, and the communities in which the corporation operates. In an age of climate change, the class of stakeholders may expand to include all human beings now living or to be born in the future.” (07/16/26)
https://aier.org/article/shareholders-and-stakeholders-in-corporate-law/
- Modern Mass Movements Menace Murica
Source: Future of Freedom Foundation
by Robert E Wright“Every mass movement comes to be defined less by what it loves than by what it loathes. Hoffer identified hatred as the most accessible and comprehensive of unifying agents because it helps to channel self-contempt onto scapegoats, the vilification of which strengthens collective unity. So mass movements, Hoffer concludes, can arise without belief in a god but never without belief in a devil. … What, then, should liberty lovers do? Certainly not launch a counter-crusade. A mass movement of individualists is a contradiction in terms, and those who fight monsters by monstrous means soon sport fangs of their own.” (07/16/26)
https://www.fff.org/explore-freedom/article/modern-mass-movements-menace-murica/
- Clayton’s Trump Loyalty Becomes a Problem for Warrantless Spying
Source: The American Prospect
by James Baratta“The reality is that, for all of the claims that Clayton is a saner, more acceptable DNI nominee than Pulte, the two share more in common than his supporters allow. Both of them lack real national security expertise, with Clayton being a corporate litigator, securities regulator, and enforcement attorney for his career. Both are fiercely loyal to the president, as shown by Clayton’s refusal to distance himself from the conspiracy theories surrounding the 2020 election, which Trump plans to amplify in a prime-time speech tonight. And both have shown plenty of willingness to go after Trump’s political enemies, a significant character flaw in a choice for any DNI, with reams of classified information at their disposal.” (07/16/26)
https://prospect.org/2026/07/16/claytons-trump-loyalty-becomes-a-problem-for-warrantless-spying/
- How to avoid the Crash
Source: Cobden Centre
by Tim Price“The chances are, if you speak to any financial adviser, they’ll tell you that asset allocation – how you divide up your investible pot among the major asset classes, including debt, equity, property, commodities and alternative investments – is the single most important investment decision you will make. And they’re right to do so.” (07/16/26)
https://www.cobdencentre.org/2026/07/how-to-avoid-the-crash/
- The God in the Machine Comes With an Owner
Source: CounterPunch
by John Kendall Hawkins“Terminator 2: Judgment Day gave us intelligence as hunter. Ex Machina gave us intelligence as deceiver. Transcendence gave us intelligence as god. Surveillance, then persuasion, then something close to apotheosis. The films did not plan this arc together, but placed end to end they map the territory we now live in with an accuracy that ought to make us uneasy.” (07/16/26)
https://www.counterpunch.org/2026/07/16/the-god-in-the-machine-comes-with-an-owner/
- Bob Jones’s Warning
Source: Law & Liberty
by Dennis Wieboldt“Conservatives in Washington now seek to leverage their newfound power over American higher education more decisively than ever before. But not-too-distant history reveals that reform efforts led principally by the executive branch may come with unintended consequences. Indeed, that is the lesson of one major clash involving race, religious liberty, and Bob Jones University that unfolded less than 50 years ago before the US Supreme Court. By recalling the circumstances under which Bob Jones University v. United States reached the Court, both conservatives and progressives will find lessons about the perils that accompany the aggressive use of executive power to reform American colleges and universities.” (07/16/26)
- Mr. Jefferson and Our Two Criminal Enemies
Source: Townhall
by Mark Lewis“Thomas Jefferson, as he nearly always did, nailed the point exactly. History shows that, as government grows, human liberty decreases. There is a metaphysical reason for this, and our Founders based the American system upon it. It runs like this. ‘People power’ is called liberty—the right to do what one wishes (in harmony with virtue and the laws of God). ‘Government power,’ when abused, is called tyranny. Government becomes necessary when people misuse their ‘power,’ their liberty, by living unvirtuous lives, which infringe on the rights of others. Thus, for that reason, government becomes necessary. But government power always limits somebody’s ‘liberty’—and again, sometimes, necessarily so.” (07/16/26)
- Entrepreneurship Requires More Than a Million-Dollar Idea
Source: The Daily Economy
by Per Bylund“A common but erroneous belief about entrepreneurship is that success is a property of the entrepreneurial idea itself. Sometimes described as an ‘opportunity’ that was out there waiting to be discovered and exploited, all it took for the successful entrepreneur was to come up with the ‘right’ idea at the right time. … Many of my students majoring in entrepreneurship suffer from believing in this myth: that it is the idea that makes the business and their success. Consequently, they seek that one great idea that will make them rich and successful. And when they find it, they therefore want to keep their idea secret and not tell anyone about it before launching the business. In stark contrast, practically all experienced entrepreneurs have the opposite view.” (07/16/26)
https://thedailyeconomy.org/article/entrepreneurship-requires-more-than-a-million-dollar-idea/
- Is Congress Really Going to Give President Trump New Tariff Powers?
Source: Cato Institute
by Clark Packard“A disclaimer up front: I am not a Russia specialist. I have no particular expertise on the war in Ukraine, and no informed view on whether another round of sanctions on Moscow is necessary, sufficient, or beside the point. But I do know something about what happens when Congress hands the executive branch, and President Trump in particular, unilateral and discretionary tariff authority. And the tariff title of the Sanctioning Russia Act of 2026—the long-stalled package championed by the late Sen. Lindsey Graham (R‑SC), now backed by the White House and more than two dozen senators—deserves a hard look on those grounds alone.” (07/16/26)
https://www.cato.org/blog/congress-really-going-give-president-trump-new-tariff-powers
- Populism Will Not Solve the Housing Affordability Crisis. Markets Will
Source: Ludwig von Mises Institute
by Ruel Domi“Americans are increasingly unable to afford housing. For many young people, the ‘American Dream’ seems out of reach. In moments of economic frustration, populists on both the Left and Right rush to identify villains. Left-wing populists like Zohran Mamdani, Hasan Piker, or Bernie Sanders, blame the very wealthy and cite rising wealth and income inequality as the reason why, for example, home prices have soared. Right-wing populists often blame immigrants, arguing that more people inevitably mean more expensive rents and higher home prices. What populists on both sides of the aisle refuse to grapple with—whether it’s due to ignorance or the need to feed their click-bait audiences with the usual outcasts to blame—is that excessive government intervention in markets is to blame for rising home prices.” (07/16/26)
https://mises.org/power-market/populism-will-not-solve-housing-affordability-crisis-markets-will
- The People Fighting Back: Inside Maine’s Immigrant Defense Movement
Source: In These Times
by Sonali Kolhatkar“Within hours of federal immigration agents killing a 26-year-old man named Joan Sebastian Guerrero, in Biddeford, Maine, hundreds protested in the streets of the small town demanding answers. Just days earlier, ICE agents shot and killed a 52-year-old man named Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, in Houston, Texas, also sparking protest. Although seemingly disparate — one in a small town in the nation’s whitest state, and the other in a large, cosmopolitan city in one of the most populous states — the two killings have a common throughline: both are the result of an officially-sanctioned imperative to hunt down and hurt people who Donald Trump’s administration and the Republican Party have deemed enemies. … But most Americans aren’t falling for it. From Maine to Texas, Wisconsin to California, North Carolina to Minnesota, communities are organizing and fighting back against the most well-funded police institution in history.” (07/16/26)
https://inthesetimes.com/article/the-people-fighting-back-inside-maines-immigrant-defense-movement
- E pluribus unum at 250
Source: Bluegrass Institute
by Gary W Houchens“Every July 4th, Americans light fireworks, wave flags, and sing songs. This year, we do all of that and more: the nation turns 250, a milestone grand enough to demand something beyond the usual celebrations. So here is a question worth sitting with this weekend: What holds us together? Not what should hold us together in theory, but what actually does. What shared inheritance, what common story, what sense of mutual obligation binds 340 million people into something we can still honestly call one nation? Our national motto offers a clue, and a challenge.” (07/16/26)
- Illinois Lawmakers Finally Pass Bill to End Home Equity Theft
Source: Foundation for Economic Education
by Joe Tabor“Illinois lawmakers finally passed legislation to become the last state in the country to comply with a three-year-old US Supreme Court ruling. State law allows the government to take an entire property for unpaid property taxes, even when they’re much less than the value of the property. House Bill 4537 brings the state into compliance with the 2023 high court decision in Tyler v. Hennepin County, which ruled that in taking property, state governments must give owners the value that exceeds the amount owed in taxes.” (07/16/26)
https://fee.org/articles/illinois-lawmakers-finally-pass-bill-to-end-home-equity-theft/
- Why Do Some Americans Still Call the JFK Assassination a Conspiracy Theory?
Source: Future of Freedom Foundation
by Jacob G Hornberger“[M]any Americans still cannot bring themselves to acknowledge that this ruthless, brutal, and remorseless killing machine turned its guns inwards on November 22, 1963, on the streets of Dallas. They especially do not want to acknowledge the fraudulent autopsy that the military conducted on JFK’s body shortly after they murdered him.” (07/16/26)
- Ron Paul Liberty Report, 07/16/26
Source: Ron Paul Liberty Report
“Kushner And Witkoff: Diplomats Or Shady ‘Deal-Makers’?” (07/16/26)
- The Libertarian Angle, 07/16/26
Source: Future of Freedom Foundation
“Repealing the Laws of Supply and Demand.” (07/16/26)
- Rising, 07/16/26
Source: The Hill
“Robby Soave gives his radar on new polling which shows that Haley Stevens has significant leads over Abdul El-Sayed among working class and minority voters in the race for the Michigan Senate seat.” (07/16/26)
- The Daily, 07/16/26
Source: New York Times
“ICE Ramps Back Up, With Deadly Results.” (07/16/26)
- Underthrow Podcast, 07/16/26
Source: Underthrow
“Greetings, Young Socialists.” (07/16/26)
https://underthrow.substack.com/p/greetings-young-socialists